Former Dust Devil Cools Bats of Current Dust Devils
A third straight win eluded the Tri-City Dust Devils (4-10) Saturday night in Hillsboro, where former Dust Devil Cole Percival helped his new team, the Hillsboro Hops (6-8), grab a 3-1 win at Hillsboro Ballpark. Percival (1-0), who made nine appearances for Tri-City last season, threw five innings of one-run
A third straight win eluded the Tri-City Dust Devils (4-10) Saturday night in Hillsboro, where former Dust Devil Cole Percival helped his new team, the Hillsboro Hops (6-8), grab a 3-1 win at Hillsboro Ballpark.
Percival (1-0), who made nine appearances for Tri-City last season, threw five innings of one-run ball and struck out six in getting his first win of the year for Hillsboro. The righty, son of Angels great Troy Percival, signed with the Arizona Diamondbacks organization just a few weeks ago.
His former teammates had Percival in a major jam in the top of the 2nd inning with the Hops leading 1-0, threatening to tie the game or take the lead by loading the bases with no one out. A fielder’s choice with the out recorded at the plate cut down one run-scoring opportunity, and a strikeout and flyout later Percival had escaped without giving up a run.
Dust Devils starter Chris Clark (0-2) put together a second straight quality start but got the loss, going six innings and giving up three runs (2 ER) on six hits. The righty has thrown the most innings of any Tri-City pitcher so far, posting 17 innings in his three trips to the mound.
Relievers Roman Phansalkar and Quinton Martinez followed Clark with scoreless innings to keep the visitors close.
Tri-City stayed in the game throughout the night, scoring their run on an RBI groundout by SS Denzer Guzman in the top of the 5th. 2B Caleb Ketchup, who doubled and then stole third during Guzman’s at-bat, came home to score and make it a 2-1 game at the time.
A night after the Dust Devils put up 11 runs in its biggest offensive outburst, though, the team could not find the big hit needed in the big moment, going 0-for-10 with runners in scoring position.
Ketchup turned in the lone multi-hit performance for Tri-City, going 2 for 4 with two doubles. CF Werner Blakely also doubled, tying Ketchup for the team lead in doubles with five. 3B Ben Gobbel, 1B Matt Coutney and C Alberto Rios added singles for the Dust Devils, Rios’s coming with two outs in the 9th to keep the game alive. LF Jorge Ruiz, who homered Friday night, came to the plate, but Hillsboro reliever Listher Sosa struck him out to close the game for the Hops and get his second save.
Tri-City will try to grab a split of the series in the six-game set’s finale at 1:05 p.m. Sunday afternoon at Hillsboro Ballpark. Southpaw Erik Rivera (0-0, 0.00 ERA) gets his second start of the week for the Dust Devils, facing Hops right-hander Joe Elbis (0-0, 3.60 ERA).
Broadcast coverage of Sunday’s game will begin with the pregame show at 12:45 p.m, both here and on the MiLB app.
After the series the Dust Devils will return home for a two-week homestand starting this coming Tuesday, April 23, against the Everett AquaSox. Tickets for the homestand are on sale now, with special ticket rates available for groups of 20 or more. For more information on Dust Devils single game, season, mini-plan (11, 22, 33) and group tickets, visit the team’s official ticketing site, dustdevilsbaseball.com.